Covid | NHS | Opinion | Testing

The Slow Process of Reporting COVID-19 Test Results

The process did not seem as smooth as it could have been

Photo taken by the author, Autistic Widower.

Twice a week, my children do COVID-19 lateral flow tests.
Afterwards, I report the results to the NHS via a government website, and also via their school’s online form.

The process is not especially difficult, but it seems more time-consuming than necessary, and there is certainly room for improvement.

This article describes the steps I go through, along with a few comments (shown in quotation style).

Let me apologise in advance for such a long, boring article. (But it does reflect the nature of what I’m describing!)

Before I begin, I should say that I think highly of the NHS in general.
However, government IT systems are not always the best, and it’s the details of the reporting system that I’m criticising here.

NHS COVID-19 Reporting

I go to https://www.gov.uk/report-covid19-result.

I click the “Start now” button and begin to answer the questions.

Who are you reporting a result for?